Church Heritage Record 624334

Aisled 5-bay nave, south porch, north-west tower, chancel flanked by north chapel with transept, south vestry and organ chamber.

Nave c 15m x 6m, chancel 9m

Heywood was a hamlet within the township of Heap, first mentioned in the 13th century. It still maintains a seperate identity despite development for the textile industry and the proximity of the large neighbouring connurbations. A chapel here is first mentioned in 1552 which is thought to have originated as a chantry for the Heywood family, which was successively rebuilt and enlarged. The chapel became a perpetual curacy in 1719. Framed drawings in the church show a square building with two storeys of rectangular windows, a western bell turret supported on classical columns and with external stairs. Adjacent is what looks like an outdoor pulpit. It stood within a square walled churchyard. It was demolished in 1860 to make way for the present building.

Before this however Heywood had acquired another church, St James's built in 1837-8 to the south-west of the town centre, with adjacent school. The new St Luke's was built in 1860-2 to serve the town as its parish church as it continued to expand with the cotton industry, much of the money raised by subscription. It was designed by Joseph Clarke of London, a prolific and much-travelled architect whose mature magnum opus this is. The interior carving is by Joseph Bonehill of Manchester, a talented sculptor. The church was further embellished with furnishings and fittings throughout the late 19th and early 20th century by various artists, including Clarke himself.

The town is now seeing regeneration. It has good motorway connections as the M62 has a junction close by, and there are plans to reopen the old railway line through the town to steam trains. The church is within the 'New Heart for Heywood' area, a New Deal for Communities Partnership which grant-aided the church a sum of money for ramped access in 2004. In recent years a small kitchen has been installed in the west bay of the north aisle, and there has been some other minor reordering.

The archaeological potential of the site is considerable, as the earlier chapel was apparently on the same site and there may be burials from the 18th century or earlier, although many, though not perhaps all, were exhumed in the early 1970s, when parts of the churchyard were sold off for road widening and other development. Reference should be made to the Historic Environment Record and the County Archaeologist if any development of the site is being considered.

It can be argued that this church is of a quality consistent with Grade I listing. Not only does it dwarf the surrounding buildings and form the highly visible focus of the town centre, it is architecturally of a very high quality.

The style chosen by Clarke was Decorated, and the church is a mature exposition of the High Victorian interpretation of this idiom. The impressive spire is placed outside the body of the church, and is of four stages with stepped angle buttresses and broach spire with enriched banding and two tiers of gabled lucarnes above a plain parapet. Deeply moulded 2-light pointed belfry openings, above a clock face to each side. The north wall has blind arcading, a pair of lancets to the other side walls. Beneath this the side walls have 2-light pointed windows, the north wall a gabled and crow-stepped doorway, the entrance pointed and of two orders with colonnettes. There is a steep flight of stairs to this, and it is not now used.

The main access is now from the south. Here stands the restored base of a 17th century baluster sundial from the old chapel, most of which is now in pieces inside the church awaiting restoration. The south porch is gabled and has a pointed doorway of one order, continuous hoodmould above and elaborate niche in the gable. Serrated clay ridge tiles.

Tall 5-bay nave with 6-light west window and 3-light aisle windows, continuous sill band and gabled buttresses of two weatherings. The continuous clearstorey is pierced by coupled 2-light Geometrical windows in recessed panels. The north transept has a pointed 3-light window to the north wall and 2-lights to the side walls. 3-bay chancel with 7-light east window with excellent tracery. Plain stack to the south vestry.

Moving inside through glazed draught lobbies the church impresses through the enormous spaces and fine dimensions and massing. The interior is whitewashed and bright, though the plaster and paint is peeling in many places, and clearly in need of redecoration; the plaster has been hacked off completely in the north-west corner exposing the brickwork. A fine collection of stained glass adds colour.

The nave arcades are tall and have double-chamfered arches and quatrefoil columns with foliated capitals and small broaches, carrying a very fine enriched hammer-beam roof. The church is still fully pewed with benches, of good quality with shaped and pierced ends and fronts. The floor is of stone flags, mostly under carpet or pew bases. The south vestry has a tripartite oak screen around a War Memorial altar at its west end, regimental flags hang here. The north Lady Chapel was fitted out in 1914 by the Mothers' Union, with open-backed light-stained benches of this period. A curtain separates it from the Fenton chapel in the north transept, now reordered as a vestry. There are carved angels to a string-course under the windows, which have fine stained glass by Capronnier.

High, sharply pointed chancel arch on marble shafted columns enriched with dogtooth and floriate carving, with thin elegant iron screen added in 1888 set into a dwarf wall. Barrel-vault roof. The chancel has heavily enriched sedilia under an arched organ gallery with displayed pipes to the south wall, an Easter sepulchre and 2-bay arcade to north with detached shafts and early 20th century glazed screen. Good choir stalls of the 1860s of a piece with the nave benches but enriched with blind arcading of poppyheads, and later 19th century marble and alabaster reredos and marble pulpit, the steps and floors also with alabaster and coloured marble. Together with the fine east window an excellent ensemble.